Five key attributes to take your swag to the next level

Everyone wants cool swag. But how do you ensure your swag really hits the mark? Here at Printfection we’ve seen our customer’s success (and failure) with swag. We’ve learned that cool swag isn’t just about trendy items. From this experience we’ve developed the Printfection Swagolosophy.  

The Printfection Swagolosophy

Cool swag —

Represents your brand
Is useful
Has staying power
Drives desired behaviors
Meets the objectives of your campaign

 

Let’s be honest. How long are you actually going to hold onto that fidget spinner with a generic company logo? To avoid selecting the wrong swag items, it’s important to run your choices through each one of these categories.

 

Swag Should Represent Your Brand

This is easily the most overlooked aspect of selecting swag. Think beyond your company logo and more about your company’s identity. What makes your community different and unique?   

We love how New Relic ran their data nerd campaign. They specifically chose messaging with their target audience (developers and other techies) in mind. This tagline helped their users feel part of a community.

 

Create a simple tagline or graphic that resonates with your audience. Don’t overthink it. Consider items that represent the values of your company or community. Everyday essentials can be transformed into sought-after favorites with great brand alignment.

 

Swag Should Be Useful

Useful promotional merchandise is inherently cool. Notebooks, coffee mugs, pens, and power banks are popular giveaways specifically because they’re so handy! Your audience uses these items daily.

 

Your swag is more likely to be both loved and get you those hard-earned impressions when it’s useful.

 

Swag Should Have Staying Power

Promotional merchandise that sticks around over time will earn your brand more impressions than something more short-lived. By impressions, we’re simply referring to the number of eyeballs that see your swag.

 

Impressions are important. The more you earn, the greater value you get out of your swag.

 

In addition, the longer your swag sticks around, the more your brand stays top of mind.

One of the best ways to ensure your items last is to choose high quality products. For example, the higher quality pen you invest in, the greater likelihood it will find a home on someone’s desk rather than their trash can.

The type of item is also an important factor. Mugs always seem to stick around in kitchens years after they were received. High quality pens get shuffled around the office for what seems like forever!

 

Swag Should Drive the Right Behaviors

Take a step back. Why are you buying swag in the first place? Are you trying to incentivize prospects to sign up for a free trial? Did you want to reward a customer for reaching a key milestone in their onboarding?

 

Whatever you’re trying to accomplish, make sure your merchandise will drive that behavior.

 

Think through what the audience will enjoy, how much value it should have, and how much it will help build a connection between your company and the person.

When it comes to value, try to align the item with the desired action you’re hoping for. Is the item valuable enough for the person to request a demo, give you a referral, or whatever else you’re after?

For instance, a t-shirt might be enough to encourage someone to fill out a form, but it might not influence a customer to spend hours writing a blog post about your business.

 

Swag Should Help You Meet Your Objectives

At the end of the day, you are running a business.

 

We all love cool stuff, but swag is a tool that should be focused on helping you meet your objectives.  

 

Are you trying to increase employee engagement? Drive sales leads? Decrease churn? Build a customer reference program? Don’t lose sight of that.  

Choosing the right swag items gets a lot easier when you have a few questions to help you gut-check your choices. Still having trouble? Reach out to our team and let us help!